Aaron, Belloq and the Reality of the Ark
by Balin Lord of Moria
Summary: The miracle of the Ark from the perspective of Belloq and the Nazis. Afterwards, Belloq's soul meets one of the Saints of God and learns the hard way that he shouldn't have done what he did. One-shot.


**Disclaimer:** I do not own _Indiana Jones_. Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, and Paramount Pictures own it.

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It was a dark and stormy night on _Geheimhaven_.

The time had come for the ceremony of the Ark of the Covenant. The Nazi soldiers were assembled at the topmost point of the island, some of whom held Nazi swastika banners, and René Belloq walked to the pinnacle, dressed in his Jewish High Priest vestments and the Hoshen breastplate that were a perfect imitation of those worn by Aaron and his descendants aforetime. Two soldiers carried the Ark up the natural stone steps to the equally natural stone altar on the pinnacle. Gestapo agent Arnold Toht and Colonel Herman Dietrich followed close behind.

The three men in charge of this ritual had differing opinions of the whole thing. Belloq was eager to see the genuine pieces of the Covenant inside the golden chest, and it enthused him to speak with God through this fine item of the Israelites. Dietrich, being a Nazi, didn't like the idea of being involved in what he called a "Jewish ritual." It was unbecoming of a member of the master race to get involved with a religious ritual of his people's sworn enemies, and he almost felt defiled by it. It made him upset. As for Toht, he thought this was all nonsense. He never had any interest in the Ark, professionally or personally, and the supernatural imperative of his assignment meant nothing to him. To Toht, the spiritual stuff was for the feeble-minded. After all, somebody did once say, "Superstition is a religion of feeble minds."

Their adversaries, Indiana Jones and Marion Ravenwood, were tied to one of the wooden lamps that lit up the Tabernacle Captain Mohler had set up for the ritual, but Belloq and his allies no longer concerned themselves with them for the moment. There was no way they could escape now, and they would have a great show of the magnificence of the Ark.

The soldiers set the Ark down on the altar in front of Belloq. He knew that it was important to pay the proper respect and reverence to God before opening it, so he began to chant in Hebrew a prayer that spoke of Jehovah being the only True God and the One to whom the glory should go. He held a ram's staff in his right hand and his left hand hovered over the mercy seat that was the Ark's sacred lid. The Nazis watched with curiosity, wondering what could be in the Ark. Two men controlled a movie camera, filming the event for the Fuhrer to see, as proof of the reality of the Ark's genuineness. Dietrich and Toht tried to block the chant out of their heads; they had so little use for such an arcane spell, though for slightly different reasons.

At last, when the chant was finished, Belloq, hiding his anticipation as best he could, nodded to the two men who had carried the Ark to the altar, and they lifted the mercy seat off of the top of the Ark, laying it on the ground in front of the altar. Belloq, Toht, and Dietrich slowly approached the open chest. Many of the soldiers walked a few steps forward to see what was inside themselves. Dietrich removed one of his gloves and dipped his hand inside the darkness of the Ark's interior to find its contents. Belloq hid his excitement surprisingly well. Then Dietrich lifted his hand out of the Ark…

In his hand was a handful of white sand and dust that flowed through his fingers. _What?_ Belloq thought. _This is what the Ark holds inside itself?_ He took some of the sand in his own hand and stared in disbelief at what seemed to be the contents of a false Ark. Dietrich, greatly disappointed, threw his handful of sand away. _So this is what we got! Thanks for nothing, Bellosh!_ He backed away from the Ark haughtily. Toht, though, was evidently amused by their disappointment. He didn't think there was anything really sacred inside that chunk of gold, and he giggled his effeminate laugh, much to Belloq's personal discomfort.

At this point Belloq wasn't sure what he was going to do. He felt like the Nazis were going to lynch him or gun him down for his perceived incompetence. He could also somehow sense Dr. Jones laughing at him scornfully, even though he couldn't hear any laughter coming from the lamp where Jones and Marion were tied. But in a moment that was all about to change.

A sizzling sound suddenly cut through Toht's laughing. Several heads turned. It looked like the electric generator that powered the lamps was overloading or something. Then, without warning, one by one, all the lamps' bulbs burst, including the one on Indy and Marion's lamp. It started with the lamps set up behind the Ark. Then it spread to the lamps surrounding the soldiers. Finally, after the last one broke, the generator made a loud noise, and it was somehow busted.

It was suddenly much darker on _Geheimhaven_ than it was a minute ago. Everyone looked around with no small level of surprise. Even Belloq wasn't sure what happened at first. Then, the sizzling and bursting noises were replaced by an increasingly loud humming sound. Belloq looked down into the Ark. He was startled to find that a whitish light was starting to form within it, and then started to slowly pour out of the Ark. The soldiers, no less alarmed by the sudden turn of events, slowly backed a short distance from the sacred chest, as thin wisps of light and glowing smoke began to come out, making strange whispering noises as they did so.

The Nazis hearts started to beat a little faster. The two soldiers at the very front got nervous and started to retreat from the Ark, running to the very back of the Tabernacle and watching from a safe distance, or so they thought. Neither Belloq nor any of the Nazis overheard Indy whisper to Marion, "Marion, don't look at it! Shut your eyes, Marion! Don't look at it, no matter what happens!" They didn't notice as Indy and Marion indeed did close their eyes and turn their heads away from the Ark. But they did notice what happened a few seconds after their prisoners shut their eyes.

The wisps of light suddenly became brighter and larger, and they started to take shape. The stunned Nazis watched dumbfounded as the light became beautiful, ethereal spirits and swarmed about the Tabernacle, using weird voices to "speak" in noises that resembled the sounds of animals as they flew about.

It started off slow for a few seconds. Only a few spirits flew around, though the Nazis found themselves constantly dodging and ducking the spirits. This was something that was beyond their comprehension. Hitler never told them about such things as this existing, and they didn't know what to make of it.

The spirits' numbers soon increased, and they were flying all over the place. Nazis were dodging, ducking, and being run through by the ghosts. The Ark and its mercy seat began to glow with a bright golden light of its own. By this time, Belloq had recovered from his dismay, realizing now that this was the genuine article he had looked for. It was astounding, all these spirits, presumably angels of God, flying all about the pinnacle of the island as if they were putting on a show for them. He found himself smiling at the very power of the Almighty, and felt honored that he was there to experience this.

Dietrich, meanwhile, had forgotten his rage, but he wasn't smiling like Belloq. This had surprised him no less than it had his men, and he couldn't help but feel a sense of wonder, not knowing what to make of this. But it also made the normally imperturbable Colonel nervous, because he couldn't think of any way this could be contained or controlled. And Toht? He was no longer laughing. In fact, he didn't know it yet, but he would never laugh again as long as he existed. All these strange spirits and ghosts were quite astonishing to his eyes. _How can this be true?_ Toht asked himself. _The chancellor of Germany never implied that any of this was so, and I thought he knew everything there was to know about the world!_

The spirits continued to swarm about. The cameramen had a hard time filming all of this. The other Nazis almost panicked. Those with Nazi banners almost dropped them on a few occasions. To Belloq, though, this seemed a wonderful experience, and in his ecstasy, he shouted, "It's beautiful!" Then he, along with a disbelieving Toht and Dietrich, watched as one spirit that took the form of a beautiful, long-haired woman, flew in front of their faces and gazed at them. Belloq wondered if this was the face of God Himself.

And then, it happened.

Suddenly, without warning, the woman-like spirit transformed into a ghoulish ghost with tattered clothes and a skull for a head. It reminded Belloq of the Angel of Death at that moment. The skull spirit rapidly became more intense to look at, and it howled menacingly at Belloq and his Nazi conspirators. Words could not describe how scary that sight was. Belloq reeled in alarm. Toht screamed in terror like a scream queen, too frightened to move. Dietrich produced a lower-pitched scream as he trembled in his own boots. The other Nazis gasped in fear as all the other spirits became sinister to look at, and they were all rooted to the spot in terror.

It was then that they all learned their fatal mistake. Belloq and the others heard Marion yell, "Indy?!" And then they heard Dr. Jones reply loudly, "Don't look at it; keep your eyes shut!" Belloq knew at that moment that he had done the wrong thing to open the Ark and look at its contents, as well as at the spirits flying around them, but he also realized that he had learned it far too late. Suddenly, the spirits vanished in a poof! Then a hot wind started to blow. The Ark glowed even more brilliantly than before, and Belloq's formerly jubilant face changed to horror as holy fires started to come out of the Ark. Soon pain was added to the horror as his body absorbed the holy fire like a conduit. Toht and Dietrich continued to scream and tremble.

Then, the executions began. Bolts of lightning and fire shot out from Belloq and rapidly struck the assembled Nazi soldiers in their hearts, usually two by two. The soldiers cried out in pain and struggled to cling to life, but there was no escaping the wrath of God when he wanted you to die. As they died, their bodies were forced into a kneeling position on the ground, and then lay face down on the ground, motionless. The hapless soldiers knew they had nowhere to go to escape this, so they just stood there and allowed God to strike them down. The movie camera was incinerated from the inside out, and its cameramen lost their eyes in the process. The swastika/eagle banners fell to the ground with their bearers as they, too, were killed. It continued for a few more seconds, finally stopping with the two Ark-bearing soldiers who had retreated from the altar, wrongly thinking that they would be safe in the back of the Tabernacle. As God finished the job of executing the soldiers, he pulled their souls out of their corpses and took them away to be judged.

It was, of course, at this moment, as the last of the soldiers died, that the Ark produced the cruelest fates for those most directly involved in its desecration. Again without warning, the holy fire surrounding Belloq abruptly became hotter and hotter, until it was super hot. Dietrich, naïvely unable to fathom what he'd done wrong, continued to tremble, moan, and scream, but now his screams of terror changed to screams of rapidly increasing pain and agony as his flesh heated up. Toht, effeminate to the end, screeched in his own agony as he felt his face soften and heat up. Belloq was now screaming his anguish out, too, as the holy fire scorched him like the fires of Hell itself. He dropped the ram's staff and clapped his hands to his head, which felt like it was getting a major migraine.

And then, things started to get gruesome.

First to go was Dietrich. Unable to speak, he was practically begging for release from the pain in his mind, but now he somehow heard a voice in his head say that it was too late for him, and that he should have known better than to disturb the Ark of the Covenant. His screams of pain were now also screams of despair as the superhot fire hollowed out the inside of his head, destroying his skull and his brain. His face, and soon the rest of his body, shriveled up and liquefied, and he perished.

Next came Toht. Immediately after Dietrich's passing, the heat was so fantastic that Toht could no longer feel like he was a whole man. He was thinking that this couldn't be happening, and begged the immortal Adolf Hitler to save him from it, but such help never came. His face liquefied and melted right off his skull, and his screams became muffled by a watery sound coming from the liquid flesh. His glasses slid down and fell off his former face. The sadistic Gestapo agent was now not so much man as a melted thing touched by God's wrath as his melting body sank to the ground.

Finally, Belloq died. He could not understand how he had displeased God so. All he wanted, so he thought, was to use the Ark to have a special audience with God, even if it meant doing it in front of the Nazis. The Ark was unlike any artifact he had ever gone after before, and he wanted to be the first one in modern times to see it used the way the ancient Israelites used it. But now he had a sinking feeling that he was going to go to Hell at any moment, and he let out a final scream of agony before his head, which felt like it was in a place where it couldn't withstand the high pressure, exploded violently…

Aaron, prophet of Almighty God and first High Priest of Israel, had observed this event from the Kingdom of Heaven. Considered one of the Saints by many, despite his several sins while helping his brother Moses lead the people of Israel through the desert, he had looked down on the Tabernacle after God had commanded him to see the foolishness of people who wanted to take advantage of the holy rites God had set up for him on Mount Sinai. And now, as the holy fires that had just killed Belloq, Toht, and Dietrich became a blazing inferno spreading throughout the whole Tabernacle, the soul of René Belloq was brought before Aaron, who was dressed in the _true_ priestly garments and Hoshen that Moses and the people of Israel had made for him and his descendants. And the man of God looked scornfully on Belloq and his imitation vestments.

"It never occurred to you that it is lethal, and damning, to touch or look inside of the Ark of the Covenant, nor that it means certain death to look on the face of God on His temporary Earth, did it, young Frenchman?" Aaron asked Belloq sternly.

"No, it did not," Belloq admitted fearfully.

Aaron gazed at him for a moment and said, "It is not my place to judge you. I was just as much a sinner as anyone else when I lived on Earth, and my judgment was not always perfect. I am simply a priest of God's chosen people, and the peacemaker among the fair people as well, which once got me in trouble concerning the golden calf. I am a fairer man than my brother Moses, who speaks and acts with perfect righteousness and bold anger when necessary, and if it were my part to judge you, I might have considered you to be forgiven, for you were a believer in God."

Belloq wasn't sure where this was going. "But I am not the Judge," continued Aaron, "and the wisdom of God is always greater than the wisdom of man. You should not have attempted to deceive God with those fake priest vestments and that Hebrew chant. God always knows when someone lies, and lying to God is the worst form of dishonesty there is."

"Please!" Belloq pleaded, "There must be something I can do to-"

"It is too late," Aaron pronounced, "God hates sin and deception, and you chose the wrong means to speak to Him. The Ark of the Covenant is a sacred object of God, but prayer is also a means of speaking to Him, and you never truly did that. If you had repented of your sins and believed in Jehovah, you would now have an honorable place in Heaven, and you may have even had a personal audience with the Lord and with Jesus, and perhaps also with me. But now, the fires of Hell will consume you and your Nazi collaborators until the time comes for you to be transferred to the Lake of Fire at the end of the world. But look, the conflagration caused by your actions has ended, and observe what has happened to your prisoners!"

Belloq looked at the island. The inferno was gone. All the dead bodies, their guns, the camera, the banners, everything except the broken lamps, the busted generator, and some unused equipment were destroyed. And lo! On one of the lamps, Indiana Jones and Marion Ravenwood stood hand-in-hand, their ropes burned away, alive and well. They were spared from the wrath of God because they didn't look at the face of God, and also because they never desired the Ark for selfish or vile purposes. And somehow Belloq knew that the Ark was going to make it safely to the United States now.

"Yes," said Aaron, "Behold what you have wrought! But now your time has come to join your allies in the place of punishment forever. Farewell, unrighteous sinner."

And with that, the bodiless soul of René Belloq was in the darkness of Hell with Toht and Dietrich and he began to experience even worse terror than he had with God's wrath.

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**A/N:** I'm pretty sure not all people consider Aaron brother of Moses to be a special saint, but I thought it would be fitting to include him here, him being the first High Priest to have close contact with the Ark of the Covenant. Besides, whether he's in Heaven in real life or not, I rather like Aaron.


End file.
